Time and Place
by bluespace
Summary: The crew pick up an interesting passanger, now will they be able to return her, and who else could she have brought along for the ride? Please read and review STORY COMPLETE!! Chapter 11 revised
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: star trek dos not belong to me, nor do any of its characters. All I own is the humble plot below and the delightful characters from my fevered brain. : )  
  
  
  
  
  
A cold wind blew across her cheek loosening her hair from its clip. She shivered slightly and hugged herself to try to preserve what little warmth her body still possessed. She clenched her jaws together to keep from chattering, who knew what was in the area that might hear the infernal noise that seemed to bounce off the nearby mountains.  
  
This of course was all his fault.  
  
'Window my butt' she cursed to herself. She remembered the argument bitterly, and in no way could what he said be translated to 'hey Maggie I'm gunna send you to some unknown place and time and you can try and figure out where you are before you get hypothermia'  
  
She wasn't sure she even had feet anymore, it was possible but also one of those things you have to take on faith, cause she certainly couldn't prove it.  
  
All she had to do was keep herself awake till she got to the peaks then maybe she could find a cave and build a fire. Yea that was optimistic. She had never walked five miles under the best of circumstances and these certainly weren't them.  
  
Maggie's mind began to drift back to how she got in this predicament in the first place.  
  
It all started with Mark.  
  
Maggie walked by Marks office on the second sub floor of the research department of, Corner Station, Utah. It was about two miles south east of Fillmore and not far from Sevier Lake, and just about 165 people even knew it existed and they all lived and worked there.  
  
She was used to hearing banging and popping and bubbling and any number of other odd but easily explained scientific noises. But tonight she heard nothing, not even his fevered mumblings when he was jotting quick notes on paper. These days with everything in the developmental stages every discovery was something to shout about, something to be proud of, something to stand up and be honored for. At least that's what they all hoped. Sometimes things didn't work out quite the way they wanted, like their resent holographic simulations, that's something you keep to yourself, like forever.  
  
She hoped he wasn't dabbling in that again.  
  
She was just going to shrug it off and keep going till she got to her office around the corner, but then she heard Jim coming. Jim was not someone you ran in to in a hallway alone, not if you wanted to get any work done ever. How one man under 80 could have that many grandchildren, be able to hold pictures of each in his wallet and tell you what they each had for breakfast and not remember telling you the same thing two hours before. Half the time the guy couldn't even find his office, but there was always time for pictures.  
  
She ducked in to Marks office as quick as she could. She shut the door quietly behind her and waited for the heavy footsteps to pass before sighing with relief.  
  
"I was just coming to get you, you'll never believe this!"  
  
Maggie almost screamed out loud.  
  
"Shesh Mark don't do that." She grabbed her chest trying to slow her heartbeat by mere force of will. Mark was standing on the other side of the lab in his standard white lab coat and pop bottle glasses. Today he was wearing a large smile that was almost boyish in its size. His tie was crooked and his socks didn't match, he was a typical genius.  
  
"Your never gunna believe this Maggie, never, never." He was staring down at some notes now reading them again and again as if they were about to spontaneously combust and he had to memorize them as soon as possible.  
  
"Well what is it." She finally said, growing a bit impatient. She had work of her own to get to. She was going to develop an engine that allowed people to travel faster then light, it involved warping space-time; it was in its final stages. Oh who was she kidding at the rate she was going, her children would have to finish it for her. Not that she had children; she couldn't even find time to date. But that was beside the point.  
  
Mark was scratching his head and wandering aimlessly around the lab looking for something or another, it was a common sight around these parts, one of the prices paid for genius.  
  
" I found a window Mag, a window."  
  
Maggie looked at him puzzled for a moment.  
  
"A window?" she asked, testing the water.  
  
"Exactly." He exclaimed looking up from his shuffle of paperwork long enough to smile at her before resuming his search.  
  
"I'm sorry mark I don't understand. There are window everywhere, this is not a new discovery." Maybe someone had finally pushed the poor guy over the edge.  
  
"That's just it Mag they are everywhere, we just never saw them before. We never saw them but they were there as sure as the glass ones are. And I found one, I've seen it. Its amazing, Mag amazing." He was at the desk now looking through yet another pile of paperwork and folders and frighteningly old food remains.  
  
"Mark I'm trying to follow you here I really am, but you're going to have to give me more then windows, what kind of windows mark?"  
  
"Aha!" he yelled holding up a ratted folder that looked like it had seen better days, along with a cup of coffee and something greasy shaped like a pizza slice, which is probably what it was.  
  
"Its all in here, Mag. I found a window. But not a normal one, not one through space and not one through time, but one through both, one through space time. We can stand right here and look anywhere any when. It wasn't a matter of acceleration or of atoms or of location. None of that mattered. It was simply a matter of sound and light."  
  
Her head was spinning, she couldn't keep up. She knew he was working on some crazy time travel theory, but no one really took him seriously, not really. They indulged him. The government had taken on Mark Dater mainly as a cover story for the press. Should the installation be found out they would point to Mark as an example of what they were attempting to achieve. Should, by some miracle, one of his theories actually prove true, well that was just a bonus, one more thing their government would take credit for finding first. There was just no way he could have found what he was claiming, it wasn't possible, was it, no it wasn't.  
  
" Mark it's not possible" she said it allowed reassuring her she wasn't being unreasonable.  
  
"Your just saying that because you don't understand that it is, but it is and I did it. All I needed was the right frequency and then the right light, and bingo I'm able to look at any time anywhere that happens to be passing by here."  
  
"Whoa what do you mean passing by mark?"  
  
"Well light travels, so dose sound, so dose time, and when they come together you can see them all, but only the ones that have reached here. I cant yet pick a time and place. Its to poliminary. But ill figure it out… soon we can see whatever we want when we want. Imagine."  
  
"I'm sorry I can't mark. It's to science fiction. And I didn't understand your equations even when they weren't this strange. Its really not my field though." She tried to let him down easy when inside she was sorry the stress had got to him and made him snap. It was sad really but it was known to happen occasionally.  
  
"I'm gunna show you, you don't have to understand, I just want someone else to see it. It too amazing to keep to myself."  
  
A little warning light went off in her brain, this could not be good it seemed to tell her… but like her other voices she just ignored it.  
  
"Yea you're going to have to show me for me to understand Mark. Why don't you let me know when you find another one." She turned and started to leave again, thinking to make her way as inconspicuously to her office and not think about windows again until she was forced to.  
  
"Oh I never lost the first one. Its still here, its always here, I just have to bring it in to focus, wait a minute Maggie and you'll understand, its amazing." He walked over to a large projector with a boom box sitting onto of it.  
  
"One minute just one minute Maggie"  
  
Maggie bit her tongue. She decided she would nod and pretend awe and then get out to there in the least painful way possible.  
  
"So you found a way to time travel."  
  
"Oh no, no. Oh no wonder you have that look, of course I didn't find time travel." He chuckled to himself as he made a few more adjustments to the projector and then turned it on. It shot a blue purple light across the room. "No just a window Mag not a door. Just a window."  
  
"So you can what just observe the different time?"  
  
"And a different place, not even necessarily earth, could be anywhere, any planet or stretch of space." He was playing with the dials on the boom box now.  
  
"So how do you know it's a different time then if you don't even know where it happens to be?"  
  
He paused for a minute. He stared off as if contemplating the cost of cheese last Tuesday. Then he seemed to simply shrug it off.  
  
"Well its all in the formula, its all in the numbers you see. I can even tell you when and were, its all in the numbers."  
  
Maggie nodded and wished he would just get on with it so she could go, his number talk was giving her ideas for her engine. Maybe the problem she was having was all in her numbers and had nothing to do with the hardware. Hardware she had a head for, formulas and theories she was ok at it was math that was her pothole in everything. Yes it had to be the numbers she was sure of it. Maybe she could just have Glen go over them for her. He was nothing if not a math wiz.  
  
"Ok Mag, step over here, away form the window." He motioned for her to move behind him.  
  
She moved to do as he asked and stand by him so he looked down and flipped the switch on the boom box.  
  
They were the noises she was constantly hearing from his lab, the bubbling and everything. She stopped walking to listen; it was like there was pipe music under it all or something. She looked at Mark again and he was waving his arms about for her to keep coming toward him. She sighed, well if she must she must.  
  
She suddenly felt a cold wind against her legs and could not immediacy place where it could be coming form. And then something seemed to grab her around the middle, but when she looked down there was nothing, just her coat in that weird blue purple color since she was standing in front of the projector. She heard Mark yell something, become vaguely aware of a backward motion, and landed face first in a snow bank.  
  
And here she was. Hearing Marks mocking voice in her head as she headed for cover only god knows where. 'It isn't a door dear stupid Maggie, its just a window, I'm just going to show you the complex problems you'll never be able to solve, wont that be fun?'  
  
She kicked some snow, only succeeding in getting more burning flakes in her eyes, what a lovely day this was turning out to be. And of course, not knowing she was going to be thrown through the space-time continuum she had not dressed appropriately. She wore only her gray slacks white shirt and annoyingly thin lab coat with an iron on moon patch on the breast pocket. And had she known where she would end up before lunch she certainly would have worn her contacts. As it was she was doing good to see the peaks, and she wasn't about to take her hands from her armpits to wipe them off. Not gunna happen. Course she couldn't be completely sure she still had hands. This is when all the times she told people she would rather be at the Alaska research station came back and bit her in the butt. She was going to die in the snow near the mountains of some planet not her own, if the two moons where any indication, and no one would even know.  
  
The least she could do was name the planet of her doom right. She just hated that horse with no name song, haven forbid she die on a planet with no name, the final insult. Lets see cold, bleak, and painful. 'I dub they algebra.' She thought to herself with a smile on the inside, since she was fairly sure her lips where frozen to her teeth by this time.  
  
She felt the wind start to pick up behind her.  
  
'Oh great just what I need, a blizzard, wont this be fun.' She tried not to cry knowing that it would just freeze and fuse her eyes shut, and that thought just added to her sarcastic misery. She just tried to assure herself that she was still dreaming soundlessly in her cozy featherbed. 'That's it Maggie Claims just let her explosive imagination get away with her again.' Why if she thought back far enough and hard enough surly there was another dream she could remember having an internal dialogue with herself in. sure there was.  
  
Oh it was hopeless.  
  
She suddenly realized she had stopped. The wind behind her had piled the snow against the back of her legs, and it was really too painful to move anyways. The wind was gone now though so that was a good sign. But now she was sure she heard voices. She was really losing it. Not long now before she started to feel that tell tale warmth of impending death. Well warmth was warmth, however she could get it.  
  
She tried to ignore them but the voices were getting louder and seemed to be coming from behind her.  
  
She slowly forced herself to turn around and see for herself that nothing was there. Through her frozen glasses she thought she saw fuzzy forms moving toward her.  
  
Oh goodie now she was going to be eaten be the large strangely formed indigenous alien. Joy of joys. She just had to stay sarcastic until she woke up then she would allow herself a good scream. She tried to turn and start running in the opposite direction, but succeeded only in landing again face first in the icy snow.  
  
She started to black out, which was weird because she couldn't remember a single time in her life were she had ever blacked out, ever. She shook her head to stay awake and also gained little wooziness for her troubles.  
  
Maggie heard the crunching of footsteps approaching in the snow and suddenly wished she had passed out. She really didn't want to be awake for this. Something grabbed her from behind and hulled her to her feet. By this time though her glasses where completely frozen and nothing was visible but white.  
  
"Its ok just hang in there." A male, (and human?) voice yelled close to her ear.  
  
And that's when she passed out.  
  
  
  
  
  
Maggie woke slowly with a decidedly painful headache. Her foggy mind screamed at her to explain its last known memories. Snow and peaks and pain and cold. A dream, she answered her frantic subconscious, only a caffeine induced nightmare from too many late hours with only the Ho-Hos to keep her company. She really needed to get out of this Utah office and someplace more conducive to working. And at least one good thing came out of her dream she wasn't moving to Alaska. Numbers. Also the numbers, she had to remember to have Glen check her calculations, maybe that was all that was wrong with her poor little engine.  
  
And that would certainly be the only way she was going to get to creepy little Algebra with its two moons and oh so friendly climate. And the human.  
  
She smiled to herself as she opened her eyes, as if there would be people on such a planet…  
  
Her thought came up short as her world focused in around her.  
  
This was not her room. This was not the vacant office she slept in when she couldn't make it to her room. This was…really bright.  
  
Her head protested the overhead lights and she squinted and winced at the pain that action caused as well.  
  
Suddenly the lights dimmed around her to a much more manageable and lets brain piercing level.  
  
"Very sorry my dear, quite unthoughtful of me. Good to see you awake though, lets have a look at that head shall we." It was a friendly male voice that seemed to lift at the end of every sentence as if perpetually happy about whatever it was doing.  
  
Slightly cold hands touched her temples and caused her to close her eyes with relief before she could focus in on the face that the voice belonged to.  
  
"Oh that's much better, thank you." She heard herself say, as the pain seemed to melt away at his touch.  
  
"Nothing to it, human pressure points are easily manipulated for pain relief."  
  
She just nodded in response. She wasn't sure she should open her eyes, in case the pain returned with the fog that she was sure would be before her since she couldn't feel her glasses.  
  
"Where am I?"  
  
"I think ill let the captain answer that. Ill just let him know you awake." He moved off she could hear the rustle of his cloths. It was probably someone new to the facility if they were still catering to the military wills. She remembered Marks little tirade, maybe something had hit her in the head while he was demonstrating his 'window' to her. That would explain her headache.  
  
The new guy was gunna get a wake up call when he realized Captain Talver didn't not like to be trouble with petty details, which included anything to do with the staff of the base. He was only interested in updates and progress. The last time Maggie had words with him was so long ago, it was a depressing reminder of her last breakthrough, the construction of the engine model. She would see him again if she could just get the number straight. Of if this little guy here woke him up.  
  
She heard the man across the room push a button and page the Captain as Dr. Flox or something like that. So he was their physician now. She opened her eyes a bit and saw the back of the man as he walked to the other side of the room. And this must be their new medical facility. Shed of course never seen the old one, but she had heard it was getting updated with the latest funds that had come in. she knew she hadn't seen any of that money. It hit her that she could actually see him across the room. No wonder she had a headache she had slept in her contacts, even though she didn't remember putting them in. Another sign she had been working to hard lately.  
  
She laid her head back down and decided to get a few more seconds of sleep before she had to deal with the captain and answer questions and eventually go back to work.  
  
She was just about to dose off when she heard a door slide open. Of cause being military he had to be quick about things blast him.  
  
She started to sit up again and opened her eyes to someone she had never seen before.  
  
"Who are you?" she asked. More then a little suspicious at the presence of a new captain aboard. One who seemed to be wearing a flight suit of some kind?  
  
The man smiled kindly and held out his hand.  
  
"I'm Captain Jonathan Archer of the Enterprise. And you are?"  
  
She shook his hand because it seemed the polite thing to do.  
  
"I'm Maggie Claims, I work here. What is the captain of a aircraft carrier doing in Utah, or is it classified." She tried to smile despite the decidedly uneasy feeling that was beginning to settle in the pit of her stomach. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the doctor approaching and turned thinking to give him a friendly smile.  
  
"Is she going to be alright doctor?" Jonathan Archer asked his chef medical officer, Dr. phlox, with concern in his voice for the woman passed out on the biobed.  
  
"Yes I'm sure she will be just fine." He injected her silently with some medicine or other the Archer didn't even try to understand. "Sudden loss of consciousness can be common in these cases of extreme exposure among humans. Also the prolonged exposure to the elements has made her woozy and excitable and I've found that the human body often knows what's best. Rest will do her the most good at this point. Why I once read a study by a fascinating man by the name of Cramin I believe the hypothesized that the human brain…"  
  
"Really doctor I need to get back to the bridge. Keep me updated on the situation will you." He politely made his way to the door as quickly as possible.  
  
"Of course captain." The Doctor answered to the closing door and retreating form on the other side, completely un offended. He turned and once again began to sort through his new collection of Tomeirian Sloth Beetles, amazing on athlete's foot as humans called it…  
  
Archer walked on to the bridge and all eyes were on him.  
  
"I still don't have any answers yet. The doctor says she could be weak for a while longer still." He headed to his ready room and notice the fallen faces of the bridge crew who where dieing to know the particulars of how they even came to have their currant passenger. He had the same feelings.  
  
He patted Porthos his little beagle on the head and took a seat behind his desk in the ready room. He picked up the report, how they happened to find this woman, and read it for the third time.  
  
They had simply been doing a routine scan of another uninhabited system. Not even a microbe seemed present even though the fifth planet seemed to have a Minshara class atmosphere capable of sustaining life. There was nothing. And then suddenly there was. A single biosign turned out to be not so hard to spot when it was the only one in an entire system…and it was just suddenly there. And it was human. That was what made them think it was a glitch, but it wouldn't go away, the biosign was really there, meaning someone was actually on that frozen wasteland of a planet.  
  
They immediacy sent a shuttle to retrieve her, no one could last down there for very long, and they where further surprised to find she wasn't even dressed for the climate, but instead nearly dead from the cold. After she was on board and in the doctors' capable hands they had spent over a day scanning every inch of the surface in search of the ship she must have used. Then they started subterranean scans to search out an underground installation she may have wandered out of. After almost three days of nothing, they had no more ideas. They were just going to have to wait for the healing patient in sickbay to come to and shed some light on the situation.  
  
He picked up and glanced at the doctor's notes. She had not surprisingly suffered some frostbite and exhaustion as well as many other side affects of exposure. The doctor had also had to remove frozen antique glasses from her face and repair some damage that the metal had caused when it had adhered to her skin. The startling thing had been her vision. Though it didn't seem damaged by the snow or ice fragments her acuity was around 20/200 making her unable to function without some corrective eye gear. Why she hadn't had it corrected at a young age seemed a mystery even the doctor couldn't speculate on. It was obviously genetic yet only the most primitive steps had been taken to compensate for it. The doctor had taken it upon himself, after the destruction of her glasses to repair her vision, the whole procedure taking less then five minutes.  
  
Archer had been tempted to take Hoshi with him when the doctor informed him that the patient was awake. In case he couldn't find another way to communicate. And then she had seemed so calm if a bit disoriented, and that puzzled him even more. She just acted as if this happened all the time. She shook his hand as if he was the one who didn't belong and needed to explain his reason for standing before her. And then her next question sent chills up his spine. He wasn't sure he would ever get over the shock or its implications. Surely it was just a joke or a silly misunderstanding.  
  
He didn't have time to clarify though because dr. phlox came to give her another injection, she looked at him blankly and passed out. He wasn't sure if he concurred with the doctor's diagnosis either, it didn't look like it was fatigue that caused her to black out, more like shock. Like shock at seeing an alien.  
  
If she had been at this distance though she would have traveled through alien space to get there, she would have had to encounter other species. And even if she hadn't, she was likely to have seen and or heard of them some how. The very fact she was out here meant she knew of volcans at least.  
  
None of it seemed to make sense but something about the whole thing rubbed him wrong.  
  
His door chime sounded just as the thought ran through his head.  
  
"Come in.," he answered distractedly.  
  
Charles 'trip' Tucker III walked in and waited for the door to close behind him. "So Captain what really happened down there in sickbay?"  
  
Leave it to the chief engineer to come straight to the heart of a situation.  
  
"The problem is trip I'm not exactly sure what happened."  
  
"Ok looks like I need to sit down for this." He said as he did just that. He easily rested his elbows on his knees and leaned forward in anticipation for his captain and long time friend to continue.  
  
"She just seemed to calm and together one minute and the next she passed out, and a comment she made, I just rubbed me the wrong way, like there's something bigger going on her then we know."  
  
"Woe you just said a lot there. What do you mean something bigger, are we talking bad guy bigger or just cosmic bigger?" he had that nervous quality to his voice that seemed to pray for a good answer, one that didn't call for his engines to be nearly blown to smithereens.  
  
"I don't know," Archer got up and looked out the window at the stars that lazily passed by as they continued to orbit the planet. "Its like I cant really put my finger on it, but its still there." He sighed. "Maybe it's just me. And maybe she was just pulling my leg."  
  
"Ok now I'm lost. Pulling your leg?"  
  
Archer looked above his friend to where he had framed all the other ships to bare the name enterprise and right there was the thing that made him uneasy.  
  
"When I introduced myself, she asked what the captain of a aircraft carrier was doing in Utah. The doc says it's just a symptom of her recovery from extreme exposure. That it's just a case of disorientation and she'll get over it with rest and medication. But something about the way she said it sounded perfectly sane to me."  
  
"So what are you saying, she doesn't remember the decommission of that ship like over a hundred years ago? That cant even be possible. She had to be pullen your leg, or the docs right. She was out on that planet in nothing but her Sunday close for far longer then was good for her. We should really wait till she can fill in the blanks before we do."  
  
"Your right. I've just been up to late." Archer retook his seat, rubbing the back of his neck to emphasis his point.  
  
"Tell me about it I can't wait for this shift to end." Trip got up and started for the door. "Ill be in engineering if anything happens."  
  
"Ill let you know." Archer said with a smile as he watched him go.  
  
And for some reason his eyes drifted back to the carrier. 


	2. Chapter 2

Captain Archer came up behind Ensign Hoshi Sato with a distinct purpose in mind. In the mystery of her origins on the planet and her odd behavior in sickbay he had forgotten she had given them a vital piece of information. Her name.  
  
"Hoshi," he said softly and leaned on the consol as he waited for her to turn around.  
  
"Yes captain?"  
  
"I want you to drop what you're doing right now. I have an assignment for you and I want you to make it top priority."  
  
She turned completely away from her screen and gave him her full attention. "Yes sir."  
  
"I want you to find out every thing there is to know on a Maggie Claims. Check under Margaret as well if you have to and match her description to the appearance of our guest in sickbay. I want to be made aware the minute you find anything."  
  
"Yes sir." She turned back to her screen and immediately started to search the database available on the ship.  
  
Satisfied that that part of the mystery was in capable hands, Archer nodded and walked over to where T'pol was bent over her viewer.  
  
"Have we found any clue as to how she got there, T'pol"?  
  
T'pol turned around with the stately square of her shoulders and faced the captain with a raised eyebrow, almost the most expressive feature she had.  
  
"No sir. I have yet to detect any other life forms or structures of any kind either on or under the surface of any of the planets of this system. Her origins remain a puzzle."  
  
"Well keep on it, keep me posted."  
  
T'pol merely nodded and returned her attention back to her viewer, as if she had never been disturbed in the first place.  
  
Maggie again woke up dazed. She remembered waking before and conversing with the new captain on the base. She still wondered why he would be called away form a navel position to oversee a low-key government research installation.  
  
Most importantly though, she remembered how she could complete her engine. It was all in the numbers. And rightly so, she was an engineer not a mathematician. But Ethan on sublevel 6 was a mathematician. All she had to do was run her formulas and calculations by him and surely he could pick out the flaws. If that was the case, as she was certain it was, she could have a working prototype in under a month. Assembly would be a piece of cake.  
  
She had to get back to her office and collect her numbers. Maybe Ethan was still here. If so he might be able to start on the numbers tonight, today? How long had she been asleep? She had to get out of this medical ward.  
  
She sat up and hung her feet over the side. It really was a beautiful facility. So clean and sterile, but it still had a welcoming feeling, like it wouldn't be the end of the world to have to spend some time there sick.  
  
She looked around for the doctor wondering where he could have gotten off to. Maybe she could sneak out and no one would notice. It would save her time that was certain, she just knew the new doctor would bring back that captain, who would ask questions about her engine and when her next update would be. Then there would be the inevitable hollow threats about discontinued funding if no results were had. She had heard it all before, there was really no reason to stick around and hear it again.  
  
She put her feet gingerly on the floor, testing her seaworthiness. The wooziness seemed to be completely gone, and the floor was surprisingly warm. She scanned the shelves again hopping to see a sign of her clothes. She saw what looked like glass drawers in one wall and, opening the top one, found it full of towels. The second one had some kind of absorbent pads in it. It wasn't until the third that she hit pay dirt. There, folded nearly and pressed, were her slacks, shirt, and coat. She took off the tee shirt and shorts she was wearing and quickly put on her own clothes. She found her comfortable tennis shoes in the fourth drawer and put those on too before she tiptoed to the glass doors with the medical seal on them.  
  
Just like the government, she thought, spend hundreds of dollars on fancy glass doors but can't afford air-conditioning in the personal quarters, gotta love um.  
  
The doors opened on their own as she approached, showing where even more of the funds had gone. The hallway beyond it was another thing to be impressed about. They must have finished the new sublevel. What was it again? 10 or 11 or something like that, she never went past 6 if she could help it. Something about being that far underground always made her nervous.  
  
The hall outside was unsurprisingly empty. They couldn't have that many working in so new a site anyway.  
  
She spotted an elevator at the end of the hall and headed towards it. No wonder every one wanted to be located on these new floors, they had even covered the walls so you couldn't see the depressing concrete slabs. She couldn't help but run her hands along the walls as she made her way to the large metal elevator door.  
  
There was a white summons button beside it; she pressed it, realizing she must be on the last floor because there wasn't a choice of up or down. The doors opened almost immediately and she stepped inside without hesitation before they closed.  
  
There were labels inside like she had never seen before. She was beginning to think this lift might not take her to her section. There was one labeled engineering section, and since it didn't have a restricted personal sticker next to it, like she was used to seeing when she wasn't allowed somewhere, she pushed it and let her curiosity win. She was dieing to know what other engineering projects had been set up besides hers and the weapons development one on sublevel four that Stephen Jolenoria ran. Maybe they would appreciate her ideas there. Why she was put in the wing she currently inhabited was beyond her. She was an engineer but they treated her like a hopeless dreamer intent on discovering a way to walk through walls.  
  
Maybe she'd apply for a transfer out of the Looney bin, as sublevel two was none to affectionately called, once she got her prototype up and running.  
  
The doors opened to another hallway much like the last with a door the other end. She could tell by the noise level there had to be a sizable engine on the other side of it. She looked around carefully for any restricted access signs. She refused to be arrested for curiosity. To her amazement there didn't seem to be any. She slowly approached the door and put her hand on it. She could feel the vibrations through the metal. She had to see what was on the other side. She had to.  
  
She pushed the button beside them and the doors opened.  
  
There was noise and movement everywhere. People on their way to do things and tweak things, vibrations from this component and sparks from that transponder. Lights blinked and throbbed on workstations. There was movement and sound and lights everywhere.  
  
And it was her engine.  
  
Her baby blown up several times and working like a well oiled machine. They had stolen her idea. Obviously they had no problem with numbers at all.  
  
She found herself sliding down the wall till she was sitting on the floor.  
  
"It works. It's working. Its not mine anymore." She didn't even realize she was talking to herself.  
  
"I missed it. I didn't get to see. They took it. How could they?" she didn't even notice she had tears running down her face.  
  
Chief Engineer Tucker, Trip to his friends, looked toward were ensign Goldman was pointing and saw the woman sitting on the floor talking to herself.  
  
"Get on the horn and let the captain know we've found his runaway." As Goldman walked off to put the captains worst fears to rest, Trip cautiously started toward the woman. This was not going to be fun, if the look on her face was any indication, she was anything but happy.  
  
"Mame, are you ok?" he said softly as he crouched down in front of her. "Can I help you back to sickbay?" she was looking right over his shoulder at the engines mumbling under her breath.  
  
"How could they? It was mine. Mine to find, and mine to build. Its so beautiful." She didn't even look at him.  
  
"Are you ok?" He asked, a little more firmly. This time he reached out to touch her shoulder. She finally looked him in the eyes.  
  
"I'm useless now. Everyone will already know. No one will care how close I was. I was so close." She had tears streaming down her cheeks as she searched his eyes for some kind of answer.  
  
"I really don't understand. But I seriously doubt your useless." He tried to smile but she looked like someone who just had her world crumble around her ears.  
  
"Here let me help you out of here, ok?" he started to help her to stand up.  
  
"How did you achieve containment, was it the anti-matter reaction that gives thrust, you need naseels didn't you, to house the trust, away from the body, I was right, naseels were needed right?"  
  
He just stared at her for a second. "Yes we use naseels, everyone dos." He was more then a little puzzled as to why this made her break in to even more tears.  
  
"Everyone. How many?"  
  
How many what, he thought. He was still trying to decide exactly how to answer that when the captain followed by Ensign Sato entered engineering.  
  
  
  
TO BE CONTINUED… 


	3. Chapter 3

(By the way I need a betta reader if anyone is interested, email me at elmo_in_space@hotmail.com thanks so much…. oh and disclaimer…none of this is mine, only the story itself belongs to me.)  
  
  
  
  
  
"What happened here?" Archer asked as he took in the scene before him. Maggie Clamies was in tears and practically hanging on an extremely flustered Trip. The look on Trips face screamed 'help me please'. Crying women where not something any man dealt well with. Hoshi on the other hand seemed to know exactly what she was supposed to do.  
  
She walked right up to the woman and embraced her in a hug pushing her head to her shoulder. They had to be almost the same height.  
  
"Its ok, whatever it is I'm sure we can figure it out." She lightly patted the woman's back and head.  
  
Amazingly her sobs died down to sniffles. Trip and Archer shared a shrug before leaning in to hear what the women where saying to each other.  
  
"I don't know what to do now. This was my life's work. It was going to take at least that long to get it to run correctly. But this is even beyond my dreams. They are so far ahead, why do they even keep me around, I don't understand."  
  
"Maybe I can help. Lets get you back to sick bay and then we will get this all sorted out together."  
  
Suddenly the woman seemed to go hard in Hoshi's arms. She pulled back to look at all of them in turn.  
  
"I'm not crazy. And I'm not sick. And don't patronize me; I'm smart I know when a good thing is over. Just let me pull my stuff together. Ill just drop by my office first. Maybe I could even be of use to a maintenance team or something. But I don't need to see a doctor just for being naive." She was very emphatic though she never raised her voice and she started to back her way toward the door.  
  
"Wait, please I just don't understand." Hoshi had her hand held out to her, begging her to explain herself.  
  
Maggie just didn't understand. The Captain was standing right there, had he really taken the post so uninformed that he was unaware of her area of development. Or maybe he didn't know what he was looking at. She on the other hand could feel it in her bones. In the vibrations under her feet and the slight humming in her ears that she had never felt nor heard before yet recognized like her own heartbeat. This was her engine one hundred times bigger and more powerful. It was her theories working. It was hers. She thought of this. This was her design. Modified obviously but still hers.  
  
Looking at it was almost painful. It was so beautiful, so simple, so familiar and yet so foreign. How could they not see how much it hurt to have a dream torn from you? It was like someone else had raised her child.  
  
She looked back at the woman. She seemed sincere, maybe she just didn't know. Maybe Captain Talver had been the one to steal her hard work from under her. Maybe that was the reason for the current transfer.  
  
She looked down and grabbed her temples, there was just too much to take in right now.  
  
"Let me just go to my office for a little while and catch my thoughts. I really just…its just to much right now. I can't think straight." She looked up first at the woman and then at the Captain, pleading with her eyes that he except her request and just let her get away to think.  
  
"Where is your office Ms.Claimes?" the Captain asked her.  
  
It was a perfectly valid question too. After al l he was a new transfer, how could he be expected to know where every one worked. Why he asked in the first place, struck her a little funny, though.  
  
"Sub level two, sir. If you'll just point me to the proper elevator, I'm sure  
  
I'll be fine getting there on my own. I'm really fine, I'm not ill, I'm just startled is all." She was trying desperately to satisfy their obvious concerns over her health, mental and physical. The last thing she wanted was some stranger to follow her to her office. She planned on having a proper nervous breakdown the minute she was alone, and an audience was defiantly not welcome.  
  
"sub level 2, underground, so then it is subterranean?" the man that she just realized she had cried on earlier, asked this question of the Captain.  
  
"It would seem so. I wonder why we couldn't see it though."  
  
"Could be cloaked, that's been known to be used against us before." The man answered with a shrug of his shoulders. Then they all turned their attention back in her direction.  
  
"How many levels are there?" the Captain asked her. He had the most openly curious look on his face. Did they tell him nothing or was he really this ignorant. The other two didn't seem ready or willing to help her out. Surely they were aware of the lay out of the place most of them lived and worked in.  
  
She decided to humor him.  
  
"Between ten and twelve to the best of my knowledge. Which, as you can see, may not be all that great unfortunately."  
  
"Is it cloaked?"  
  
"I really have no idea what that means. But if it's a military answer you seek then just cause I don't know doesn't mean no, it just means no one has seen fit to tell me." She was really getting a bad feeling now. As if the engines weren't bad enough these people were the weirdest she had ever heard, none of them acted like they had any knowledge at all of where they were. They were all staring at her with open curiosity as if the Captain was voicing their inner questions as well. And they were all dressed in flight suits as if they expected to take off in an aircraft at any given moment. Defiantly not a good sign from the military.  
  
They better not be crazy, is all she could think. That was the last thing this day needed, crazy military personnel in charge of a secret research base, which obviously contained highly advanced technology.  
  
Oh god she had to get out of here.  
  
"Um if that will be all, I'll just get going. I'm sure I can find the elevator on my own. How hard can it be really? Its not like its going anywhere." She started to back toward the door again, hopping to get there undeterred.  
  
"What do you call that planet down there?" the man in back asked this question. She didn't quite understand at first.  
  
Then it all came screaming back to her at a hundred miles per hour. The cold the planet, the two moons, the voice…Mark and his weird purple light and bubbles. Of course it was real. And that would mean she wasn't on her base. She wasn't near her base. And she was alone. It hadn't been a dream. Oh god she wanted it to be a dream. It was easier to handle that way. To much take out Chinese and to little sleep, there it was explained away. But this, how could she handle this? What was she supposed to do now? How could it ever get back, and back from where, and back from when?  
  
She sank to the floor shaking her head.  
  
"The little idiot. He just had to get something right when I was in the way didn't he. The little genius." She could just kill him. She just might if she ever found a way back.  
  
Wait if she wasn't still on that planet, where was she?  
  
"Where am I?" She asked the three who were now looking at her with as much warmth as one uses when looking at a flailing live wire. She forced herself to stand and again look them in the eyes, visibly straightening her shoulders, determined to be brave just this once.  
  
Nope that didn't work either.  
  
"If I'm not still on the planet where am I?" She tried again.  
  
"Your aboard the starship Enterprise." The woman answered her a little hesitantly.  
  
"A starship, which would explain the need for my engine. At least I got it right." They were looking at her funny. She was tempted to yell at them, 'stop it I'm trying to be logical and objective here, and your not helping!' It was all she could do not to run around screaming and pulling her hair out.  
  
"Ok I'm on a starship now and I was on that really cold planet with two moons. Alright, so what happened to get me here?" At this point she was really not expecting a response; she got one anyway of course.  
  
"We detected you on the surface and kind of figured you could use a hand. You weren't exactly dressed to explore." The man in back answered again.  
  
"What year is it?" she asked it all of a sudden taking them off guard. They nearly visibly backed up.  
  
"2152."  
  
"150 I can live with that, that's not so big a number. I mean I'm an engineer not a mathematician but I should be able to work with those kinds of numbers. I already know it starts with purple and bubbles… that's probably half the battle right there." She was talking to herself again. Yea they defiantly thought she was crazy, she could tell.  
  
"Are you alright?" This had to be the third time this same man had asked this same question. It was nice of him really but no matter what she answered she knew they wouldn't accept it. They would still look at her like an alien.  
  
Alien. There was an alien in the medical ward. She was sure she saw an alien, Or an extremely deformed man. Either way it just wasn't what she had expected to see.  
  
"Ok. I need to start again. I'm sorry. My name is Maggie Claimes and you are?" she held her hand out to the woman. She was short, but still about Maggie's height. She had beautiful black hair and an obviously Asian heritage.  
  
She hesitantly put her hand in Maggie's.  
  
"I'm Hoshi Sato."  
  
"That's a very beautiful name. Its nice to meet you." The woman smiled. Well at least they hadn't shot her, maybe polite was the way to go.  
  
She now held her hand out to the man and cocked her head.  
  
"Charles Tucker III, but everyone calls me Trip." He shook her hand with the charm of a southern gentleman and smiled kindly at her.  
  
She turned to the captain.  
  
" And your Captain Archer. So this is your ship, right?"  
  
He nodded as he shook her hand as well.  
  
"I don't suppose you have any scientists on board, cause that would just be to easy."  
  
"We have a science officer on board." Hoshi sounded so hopeful, like she wanted nothing more then to make things easier for Maggie.  
  
"Well maybe he can help me then. May I speak with him?"  
  
"It's a she and yes of course, if it will help us get some answers." The Captain indicated she should go through the doors she had earlier intended to escape from.  
  
She looked longingly at the engines again before she started to turn toward the doors.  
  
"They'll still be here later." Trip said with a smile as if he read her mind.  
  
She smiled back and let the captain take the lead. She sure hoped this science officer, whoever she was, had a vivid imagination to go with her PHD.  
  
To Be Continued… 


	4. Chapter 4

Well she certainly knew the way to sickbay now. That was about all she knew, but she knew it well. They were back in the sterile comfort of sickbay before she could even ask where they were going. She was asked to take a seat and a smiling, though tisking, doctor, quickly checked her over.  
  
"You have been unconscious for four days now, what you really need is fluids and sustenance, not a trip to engineering. Other then that though I would say you seem to be in fairly good shape. No need for you to stay here any longer really." He smiled at her " I also should let you know that I took the liberty of correcting your vision. In their removable and their frozen state your optical correctors were unfortunately irreparable. By me." He qualified. Then he nodded to the Captain, who stood nearby.  
  
She found herself absently touching her face, in a state of near shock. This she would deal with later.  
  
The Doctors name was Dr. Phlox, she had been told. And he was indeed an alien in some kind of exchange program. With the majority of the words being unfamiliar to her, she was having a hard time remembering the particulars.  
  
He did have the most startling blues eyes, though, and an almost disturbingly large smile. She couldn't help but smile back at him. He just seemed one of those people who saw the bright side of everything. Always good to have one of those around.  
  
Hoshi had also come to sickbay with them, promising the Captain an answer to some question he had posed earlier. Maggie wasn't sure what the question had been, but having the answer close on the horizon had seemed to calm him down rather quickly.  
  
"Thank you Doctor. If we could have a moment please?" The Captain left the open-ended question hanging.  
  
"Of course sir, let me know if you need anything further." And with that he left through the beautiful glass doorway.  
  
"Now Ms. Claims, if you don't mind I would like some answers please."  
  
Well at least he said please. He could always have just simply reverted to mind probes or torture. Please was a good sign.  
  
"Ok." She said sitting up straighter on the biobed and absently brushing her short black hair out of her eyes. "I don't really know were to start, and I'm not entirely convinced you'll believe me." She looked up at him to gage his reaction.  
  
Hoshi used the pause to speak up.  
  
"Captain, this might be a good time for me to answer your question from earlier. Then Ms.Claims can fill in the blanks for us."  
  
Maggie wasn't sure exactly what was going on, but if it postponed her talking herself in to a straightjacket, well then it was ok with her.  
  
The Captain nodded and turned his attention back to Maggie.  
  
"The first time you woke up you introduced yourself to me. I then asked Ensign Sato here to run a background check on it to see what we could learn."  
  
"That seems a reasonable thing to do." She said feeling he needed a reply there.  
  
"Yes well, I did the check." Hoshi said. "And it came back with more questions then answers."  
  
"Considering how I got here that's understandable."  
  
Hoshi nodded and faced the Captain to relay what she had learned.  
  
"A Margaret Claimes matching Ms.Claimes description came up in three different places. I had ruled out all three, now I'm beginning to reconsider. You see the first one is currently serving on a cargo vessel that won't be back in range for another two years. I contacted Captain Fargo and was informed that Mrs.Claimes was the wife of his first officer and currently the ship medic and expecting their third child. So I ruled her out. The second was Margaret Claimes who resided in Paris, France until she died at the age of 67 in a shuttle crash over the Atlantic. The third was the most farfetched of all. Maggie Claimes, an engineer working for the government in a secret instillation in Utah, disappeared with out a trace. One man, a fellow scientist claimed that he knew what happened to her, but his stories later led him to be committed to a local hospital for mental health treatments for a period of about one year."  
  
Maggie was listening intently the whole time. Poor Mark, he finally finds something and can't find a single person to believe him. Well she believed him. And if she ever got back to see him again she planned on telling him just that. She looked at the Captain to see how he was reacting to these bits of information. He seemed willing to listen and consider at this point. And for her that was better then being treated for mental health disorders any day.  
  
"Well the last one is the one that seems most feasible, Ensign. What else did you find?"  
  
"Well the thing is, I would have thought it was our best bet too, but Maggie Claimes, the engineer disappeared in the year 2001."  
  
Hoshi stopped talking, allowing for that bit of news to sink in.  
  
Maggie braced herself visibly for what was sure to happen next. Maybe straight jackets wouldn't be that uncomfortable after all.  
  
"So we're dealing with time travel here. T'pol isn't going to like this. Impossible my butt."  
  
Maggie couldn't have been more shocked if the Captain had up and said he was the wizard of Oz and Ensign Sato was really the Scarecrow. They were actually jumping to the right conclusion. They hadn't ruled her out, but instead she was now well on her way to being understood. She just couldn't believe it.  
  
"So, Ms. Claimes," the Captain began, addressing her.  
  
"Maggie." She corrected almost instinctively.  
  
He smiled. "Maggie, why don't you tell us how you got here? Assuming you are the Maggie Claimes that Ensign Sato is describing. Or are you a pregnant first officers wife?" he was actually trying to put her at ease. She almost fell over backwards in her shock.  
  
"No. I mean no I'm not pregnant, or a first officers wife, or anyone's wife for that matter. But yes I will answer your questions and tell you what I know."  
  
He nodded for her to continue and Hoshi smiled warmly at her.  
  
"Well I'm an engineer, but I deal more in theories then absolutes." She fell easily in to her pitch. The way she had millions of times. This was something she could control. She had made this speech about her and her work many times before and routine was a glorious thing.  
  
"When I graduated with my degrees I had planned to go straight in to development at NASA or Bowing or something equally glamorous. I ended up working in my uncle's airplane garage in Washington State instead. Then I answered a want ad one day and it turned out to be for a government research position. It was like a dream. I had been tinkering with this Idea I had since before I went to school. An Idea that it was possible to travel faster then the speed of light thought the warping of space around a vessel. I even had a rough idea of what an engine capable of doing this would have to look like. So of course I applied for the job right away. I turned out to be more then I bargained for though. It was in a secret research facility that had been set up in Utah. I was actually one of the people they had hired for strictly cover story status. We were given places to live, and places to work, and funds to work with, but we were defiantly not top priority. The bases primary function was to develop military technology. But I worked with what I had.  
  
"I was actually really close to proving my theory when a colleague of mine, Mark, made his ground breaking discovery. He found a way to see through space and time."  
  
Archer's eyebrows went up at this and he uncrossed his arms and leaned in, gaining interest in her story.  
  
" He called them windows. I of course thought he was nuts, who wouldn't, but he was convinced he was right. So he decided to prove it to me by giving me a demonstration, a private screening if you will. And well it worked, but I got in the way and the window suddenly turned in to a door, and I suddenly found myself knee deep in the snow looking up at two moons." She held up her hands in defeat. "And now you know as much as I do."  
  
There was a long silent pause from the both of them. They were thinking it over.  
  
"Maybe it would be good to bring T'pol in on this?" Hoshi suggested.  
  
Archer nodded. "This seems to be bigger then I thought. I mean a warp engine before world war III, what kind of world would we live in now."  
  
"Seems like a paradox to me, I'm really no good at those."  
  
"I'm not sure anyone is."  
  
They finally turned their attention back to her. Maggie smiled at them nervicely.  
  
"I'm not crazy." She just needed to say it out loud.  
  
Archer stepped forward and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Its ok. We believe you Maggie. This isn't the first time we've come across something like this. Tell you what, I'll have some quarters prepared for you and Ensign Sato will show you to the mess hall to get something to eat, doctors orders. Then once you've eaten and settled in we'll talk some more. I'd like my science officer to hear everything you remember about your friends discovery." He was smiling kindly and it was all Maggie could do not to break in to tears.  
  
They believed her! It was almost to good to be true.  
  
"I'd really like that, thank you."  
  
He squeezed her shoulder and then turned to Hoshi.  
  
"Let me know when she's settled in."  
  
"Yes sir."  
  
And with that he left the room.  
  
  
  
*Sorry it's so short. I'll try and make the next one longer. Feedback is always welcome! ( *  
  
To Be Continued… 


	5. Chapter 5

There were hardly any people in the mess hall when Maggie and Hoshi arrived. It was a breathtaking room. There were chairs and tables scattered about, of course, but on one wall were windows. And these windows didn't look out on mountains, or the ocean, or some waving crop of wheat, these looked out on the stars and planet and moons of space. Maggie had never seen something so beautiful in really life. Nor had she ever seen something so frightening.  
  
That was when it really hit her. She walked in to the mess hall behind Hoshi, looked up and out the windows, and stopped. She couldn't move any further. She was in space. She was terrified of heights and she was in space, how much high can you get, not much.  
  
"Are you ok?" Hoshi moved in front of her line of vision, cutting off the view of the stars. Maggie shook her head to clear it. She was ok, it was just like flying in a plane, she liked flying in planes, and she would like this.  
  
"I'm fine, just caught me a little off guard is all." Hoshi turned to look at the windows herself.  
  
"It did me too at first. Flying through space was never something I aspired to do. You get used to it though. Just like living in a high-rise I think." She turned back to smile at Maggie and motioned her to another wall.  
  
This one had a slight recess in it with a lighted shelf. Maggie assumed this must be where they got food.  
  
"The shifts don't go on break for another half hour, so we have the mess to ourselves. Chief can make you just about anything you want."  
  
"Anything?" She told herself she was really just hunting for clarification is all.  
  
"Anything." Hoshi answered with a slight giggle in her voice.  
  
"Can I have a slice of pizza then?" she was nothing if not a simple girl. If it can be delivered, she could eat it. Pizza, though, had always been her weakness, always.  
  
"Sure." She turned and talked in to the recess. "Chief, one slice of cheese pizza for our guest please, and one for me too." There was a blinking light panel that indicated he had gotten her message. Hoshi grabbed two glasses off of a near by tray and moved past Maggie to a smaller wall recess on the adjacent wall.  
  
"This is were we get something to drink. It can give you just about whatever you want to." She then waited for Maggie to supple the drink she wanted.  
  
"Oh, um milk please." Hoshi gave her a slightly puzzled look but then turned and placed one of the glasses in the recess and requested milk, cold. Almost instantly milk poured from a spicket in to the waiting glass. Hoshi turned and handed it to her.  
  
"I've decided not to follow you on that one, sorry." Hoshi said as she placed her own glass in the recess and asked for coffee, hot. And from the same spicket came her drink.  
  
"That's amazing. Dos it have, like, voice activation and a store of certain drinks?" She needed to know how everything worked. She hated feeling out of place. Even though it was her general state, she still didn't have to like it. Maybe if she could just figure things out here, use them like she always had, she wouldn't feel so lost. These were the little things she could control, she like them.  
  
"It's a gene resequencer. Its really complicated, you'll have to ask Trip about it, I was never good with machines. I just know it takes what we have and makes what we want." She took a sip of her coffee. "And it seems to work just fine."  
  
Maggie laughed a little in the back of her throat. At least she wasn't the only fish out of water. Hoshi motioned for them to take a seat while they waited for the food to get done.  
  
"So what do you do on the ship? You're not an engineer obviously, and you don't like space so I'm guessing being a pilot wouldn't be very practical. So what do you do?"  
  
"I'm the communications officer. See I have this talent for languages and seeing as we're on a mission of exploration, the Captain decided that was defiantly a talent he needed. Plus I have a bit of a weakness for new and unusual dialects. There have been so many even just in the short time we've been out here. Its like a dream job on the good days."  
  
"And on the bad days?" she took a sip of her milk and eyed Ensign Sato with new respect. What she wouldn't give to have an ear for languages. She could barely say 'si' or 'hola' with a straight face. Really she had enough trouble with her own language that another one was simply out of the question. Probably why she chose a field where interaction was only a sporadic nuisance and not a daily routine.  
  
"On the bad days its almost a nightmare. But you take the good with the bad, and in this case the good defiantly wins. What about you, you don't like space, why are you developing an engine to travel faster through it?"  
  
"Sure turn my question around on me, that's not fair." But she smiled and answered anyway. "It was really more a puzzle to solve in the beginning. I saw it and I wanted to know how to make it work. So I studied and tried different combinations. Its like seeing something you just know goes together but someone lost the lid to the box so you just have to wing it."  
  
"The lid to the box?"  
  
"You know like a puzzle lid." Hoshi was shaking her head.  
  
"Never mind. It was just this problem in front of me that I was sure I could solve. And I think I did. I had the model ready and every thing. It was just the numbers that threw me. I've never been any good at numbers. I was on my way to getting someone to help me with them when I ended up hiking with hypothermia."  
  
"That will change your plans I suppose."  
  
"Yea, a little. Then I saw those engines though. They are so beautiful, everything I imagined and more. I don't think I'll ever be able to top that." She was becoming wistful and depressed; she could feel it coming like an approaching thunderstorm or a really mad bull. Either way it was not something she wanted to wait around for.  
  
"But its nice they got made anyway, or else where would you learn new languages. Only some many on earth right?" she put on a mock smile, hoping against hope that Hoshi would catch the hint and let the subject die and silent peaceful death.  
  
It turned out she didn't have to.  
  
The whole ship shook violently on its artificial axis. Glasses and their contents careened across the floor and in to the opposite wall with a crash. Unfortunately the people hand it no better. Maggie hit the wall with a sickening thud and clutched her wrist to her chest. Well that hurt a little more then she would have liked. Life was just continually getting better for her. It seemed some higher being really wanted her in sickbay, like with a vengeance.  
  
She heard Hoshi groan and looked over to see her get thrown in to a table headfirst. Thankfully she had her arms above her head and didn't seem to be unconscious.  
  
Then just as suddenly as it had begun, the shaking stopped.  
  
Maggie had the irrational urge to get in to a doorway before the aftershock hit. Instead she crawled over to Hoshi who was lying on her back trying to catch her breath. Now it was her turn to ask 'are you ok?' and it wasn't nearly as satisfying as she thought it would be.  
  
"I'm alright. Just got the wind knocked out of me." Hoshi answered as Maggie helped her to sit up.  
  
There was a beep that echoed through out the mess hall, followed by the Captains voice.  
  
"Ensign Sato report to the bridge, and bring our guest with you if you would."  
  
"That would be us." She said as she got completely to her feet. She motioned Maggie to follow her and walked gingerly out the door.  
  
The halls were one mass of activity. People ran or walked quickly about, either inquiring after the situation, hurriedly making there injured way to sickbay, or just as quickly scurrying to there posts. Maggie found it all a bit unnerving. Shouldn't these people be more hardened, more military? Didn't they know they were in space and could die from a micrometer in the hull? They all seem shocked and appalled something had dared to shake their world. Yet it seemed to Maggie, what with it being space and all, they should kind of be expecting the unexpected. Now her on the other hand, she was allowed to panic. It was her right as a woman of the twenty-first century.  
  
They reached the bridge through the elevator, which Hoshi referred to as a lift. Maggie seemed to recall an old English film she had once watched had called elevators that. It had seemed so charming.  
  
Yep she was losing it again; she was now to the point of analyzing word structure. Great, just great.  
  
She had expected there to be more people on the bridge then there turned out to be. When they exited the 'lift' Hoshi had gone straight to her post. The Captain was talking with a woman dressed in what appeared to be a brown cat suit, but hey, whatever works right. The rest of the people present consisted of, a young black man seated in front of a consol facing a large window, or view screen, and a short dark haired man seated on the opposite side of the room from her. He too had a consol in front of him. They all seemed to have very important and specific things to do, and were so doing them.  
  
She felt extremely out of place. More so then normal. So she just stood off the side and tried to refrain from literally twittling her thumbs.  
  
Finally the Captain looked up from his discussion and motioned for her to join them. Which of course caused her non-to smoothly to look behind her to see whom he was talking about.  
  
"Me?" she asked, pointing to herself as if just incase one of those present happed to be named Me.  
  
He nodded and so she approached with no small amount of trepidation.  
  
"This is T'pol, my science officer. I would like to you tell her how you came to be here." Maggie nodded to the woman he had indicated and thought she may have seen pointed ears when the woman retuned the gesture, but at this point who cares.  
  
"You want me to explain it now? Aren't you like under attack or something, surely there could be a better time." The last thing she wanted was to die just because the Captain thought it fair to fulfill is obligation to her.  
  
"The shockwave we experienced seems to have originated form your point of origin. With more details I may be able to extrapolate a cause for this occurrence." The woman sounded like a, well like a computer actually. She was so precise and articulate, there was just no other way to think of such speech, was there?  
  
"Alright. I'll tell you whatever you need to know, but it wasn't really my field, I'm just an engineer." She was really getting tired of having to explain that to people over and over again.  
  
She slowly began to recount how she came to be in her current situation. She left nothing out; she included the purple light, the bubbles, and Marks insistence that it was a variable window and nothing more.  
  
When she was done the woman simply raised one of her sculpted eyebrows and turned her attention to the captain who had waited patiently through the narrative.  
  
"I believe I have a rough estimation of what is happening down on the surface."  
  
"Go on." The Captain urged her.  
  
"I believe her collogue was, as she stated trying to make a window, an observation, if you will, on space-time. With inexperience this window proved random and uncontrollable, which resulted in its transformation in to a door. A portal through space-time to this point. What seems to have occurred is that because of her passage through said portal it has become wedged as it were, to this time and place. Unfortunately, though, the other side of the portal remains unstable and continues to shift. I believe what we experienced was one such shift that took the other side dangerously close to a supernova aftershock." She paused to let her hypothesis, most of which went way over Maggie's head, to sink in.  
  
"I believe, Captain, that the wisest course would be to destroy the portal at this end before more damage is done." Archer was nodding thoughtfully at T'pol's suggestion. Maggie on the other hand, was shaking her head enthusiastically.  
  
"If it's wedged I may be able to get home though." She desperately wanted nothing more. Never again did she think she could ever feel this misplaced. She was determined to be nothing but outgoing and approachable when she got home, the life of the party.  
  
"That would be quite impossible. The exit vector is completely random at this point; there would be no way to get you to where and when you came from. Not to mention the considerable snag in space time your return would inevitably cause."  
  
Maggie just blinked at her. If she was not mistaken, which, considering more then half of that was just un-understandable, could likely be the case, she had just been told she could never get home. The nerve of this woman. Who was she to make such a decision?  
  
She was about to tell her just that when her thoughts were rudely interrupted by the man seated across the room.  
  
"Captain I'm picking up a life form on the planet. It appears to be in much the same place as Ms. Claims was." He had a strong English accent. It was almost comforting to know things as familiar as foreign accents hadn't changed. How did he know her name?  
  
Ok losing it again, she had to stay on track.  
  
Archer walked over and pressed a button on the center chair.  
  
"Archer to engineering."  
  
"Tucker here, sir." Wow that was fast Maggie thought.  
  
"Trip I need you to prep a shuttle for immediate launch.  
  
"Sorry sir no can do. That shimmy damaged the docking clamps, it will take me at least twenty minutes before any of the shuttles can be disengaged."  
  
"We could use the transporter, sir." The English man suggested.  
  
"Are the transporters still working Trip?" the Captain asked into the speaker.  
  
"As far as I know, yes sir."  
  
"Good enough, Malcolm why don't you go down there and bring our new friend aboard before it freezes."  
  
"Aye sir." Malcolm said as he left the bridge.  
  
  
  
To Be Continued…  
  
this would be a lot easier with a little more feed back : ( 


	6. Chapter 6

*More will come I promise : ) *  
  
  
  
  
  
"I am unable to get a clear bio-reading on the life form on the planet. The sensors seem to be malfunctioning." T'Pol informed the captain as Reed left the bridge.  
  
"Understood. Security team to transporter for back up." They then began the wait to see exactly what it was they were inviting on board.  
  
"I'm at the transporter sir, beginning transport now." Reeds voice sounded through the bridge.  
  
And then nothing.  
  
"Mr. Reed, report."  
  
Still nothing.  
  
"Archer to security team.'  
  
No response.  
  
"I'm guessing this is really not good." Maggie muttered under her breath as she gingerly rubbed her soar arm and tried to resist the urge to push her glasses up the bridge of her nose. Since there was really nothing there she didn't want to look pathetic. Not that any one would have notice they all seemed actively employed in the act of not panicking.  
  
"Archer to engineering."  
  
"Tucker here." The response came immediately.  
  
"Trip meet me at the transporter."  
  
"Aye sir."  
  
Archer headed for the lift and was followed by T'pol. Maggie felt like she was being left behind and so at the last minute, she also entered the lift.  
  
"What are we going to do now?" Archer was looking at her as if she had suddenly sprung and extra head.  
  
"You should have stayed on the bridge." He looked like he was not too happy that she hadn't done just that. But what the heck, this wasn't her time; he wasn't her Captain, what had she to lose. Her life maybe, but that was beside the point.  
  
"I'll keep that in mind I maybe next time I'll do just that." She was looking him straight in the eyes, why should she be intimidated, no reason at all.  
  
He sighed deeply and shook his head in resignation.  
  
The lift opened and Trip entered the slightly cramped area.  
  
"Pick up an extra passenger did we?" he asked good-naturedly as he passed out the weapons he had brought with them. Everyone got one with which to defend their very lives, except Maggie of course, but hey she was new.  
  
She felt the lift come to a stop and they all faced the door again with her in the rear and barely able to see over the Captain, and Trips shoulders.  
  
What she did see though wasn't all that promising. The hall was dark and trashed. The overhead lights were blinking spatially and components of this and that littered the floor, while more liquid substances spattered the walls.  
  
She saw Trip and T'pol share a look before they exited the lift with weapons drawn and pointing in different directions. She exited right behind the Captain and heard the doors close very closely behind her. From the way he moved she guessed he thought she had remained inside, fat chance.  
  
She then stepped in something decidedly not pleasant and began to think this was not the brightest idea she had ever had.  
  
Trip and T'pol were in the lead systematically checking each room and then moving on to the next with graceful efficiency. Maggie carelessly tripped on a metal something or other and fell in to the Captains back, startling him considerably and causing all firearms to be instantly pointed in her direction. She righted herself and straightened her shirt before shrugging innocently.  
  
"Sorry." She mouthed. Trip smiled at her, T'pol simply raised an eyebrow, and if looks could kill, the Captain would have done way with her several times already.  
  
There was then a noise from one of the rooms up ahead that had yet to be checked. The three of them moved to check it out, the captain motioning rather forcefully for her to stay put. That she had no problem with. The more she saw the damage the less she wanted to meet the cause.  
  
They took positions on either side of the doors. Trip on the far side and T'pol and Archer on the other. Trip nodded slightly to T'pol and they both moved in to the doorway at the same time, followed closely by the captain.  
  
She heard a muffled moan from inside the room and some one whispered, "Its ok now, we'll get you to sick bay."  
  
Good, she thought, no monster just wounded. It had probably been a systems failure of some kind. That was known to happen on big ships. Well at least it was on big ships in her time, which was 150 years removed from this time. But logic was logic and if that's the way her mind saw it, well then that the way it was. She heard scrapping sounds from inside the room and assumed they were helping the injured to the door.  
  
She would help if she didn't think it would later get her yelled at.  
  
And that was when she felt the breath on the back of her neck, and then it growled. One of those low menacing growls that you just know comes from something three times your size. Three large bony fingers then proceeded to rest themselves on her shoulder.  
  
Maggie squeezed her eyes shut. This was not happening. She couldn't scream, she wouldn't scream. Maybe if she was still she could will the thing to just go away. Something sniffed near her ear, something smooth and long and sharp, if the nick on the tip of her earlobe was any indication. She tried to hard not to move, so hard.  
  
"No" she didn't even realize she was whispering it. But she was over and over and over again. As if she could make it be nice simply by saying those two letters again and again.  
  
The growling started again and the hand gripped a tighter hold on her shoulder.  
  
This was it. She was going to die. She had seen her share of alien movies, of creepy killing things that come in and sniff and terrify seconds before they proceed to disembowel. This was always the part where she closed her eyes. But in this case that didn't seem to be helping. She still heard the growl, still felt the fingers, still heard the breathing near her head, still felt the slight scratch on her lobe. This was way to real.  
  
The monster, the creature, the alien, was backing up, and due to its grip, so was she. Oh now it was taking her someplace to store her body for later. She had read somewhere that this is what the crocodiles did, or was it alligators.  
  
'Oh come on Maggie that's neither here nor there!' she reprimanded herself. She figured she was now officially in shock. She had thought she was before, what with the being thrown through space and time, but no that was nothing compared to this.  
  
She felt something slither around her waist. She wasn't even going to guess what that was. Instead she settled for merely whimpering. She no longer had the strength of mind even to repeat 'no' anymore. This was really bad. This Bad Ugly Bad Thing was dragging her who knew where to do who knew what and all she could do was whimper and cry and let it.  
  
She opened her eyes slightly to try and judge exactly where it could possibly be taking her. She saw the lights still in the room where the wounded were. They were probably still making there way to the door. She, unfortunately, wasn't going to be there when they returned. The Big Ugly Bad Thing, which her mind had officially decided to label it, was backing in to another of the open doorways closer to the lift. Even though she was offering it no help, or resistance for that matter, it was having no problem dragging her silently with it.  
  
She looked down. That was when her brain registered that her feet where no longer on the ground, and the thick orange scaly thing around her middle was holding her up. She slowly, and against her better judgment, looked at her shoulder. Yes there were the three decidedly ugly looking fingers, with, what could only be described as talon at the end of each. They had to be seven inches easy even with out the claws added in.  
  
She felt the breath near her ear again as she lost sight completely, of the hall and was dragged to the far corner of the room. The lights were completely out in this room the darkness in the corner was all encompassing in its totality. Another not good sign.  
  
She ventured her gaze farther over her shoulder and took in what could only be a beak, hawk-like in shape and huge in size.  
  
'Ok I don't want to see any more' she franticly thought as she determinedly faced forward again and tried to slow her breathing so she wouldn't pass out and die. Although unconsciousness could almost be a good choice about now.  
  
The Big Ugly Bad Thing looked up suddenly, its huge beak grazing the side of her head in its hast. She looked up as well on instinct and saw a second skinny but powerful orange arm reach up and dislodge a panel above their heads. Before she even knew what was happening she was thrown in to the opening and the creature, jumped, flew, something, in after her shutting it behind them.  
  
This was a situation she really didn't want to be in. and with all her degrees and knowledge, and movie watching to back her up, she could think of not one single thing to do to save her life.  
  
So instead she went with unconsciousness. Hey when in doubt sleep, that's what she always said right. She probably should have laid down first…ouch.  
  
And the world went black.  
  
  
  
*I know its short but I'm trying to update once a day so they may be short, but hey, their there. : ) And thank you so much for the feedback, I just can't stop smiling whenever I read some. I dedicate this chapter to Jill…thank you!! 


	7. Chapter 7

Archer struggled under the added weight of Ensign Newman to get to the door. Newman was the most severely injured and so they needed to get him so sickbay as quickly as possible. Behind him Trip was helping Malcolm who seemed to have a sprained or broken ankle to go with his bumps and burses. T'pol and Crewman Chang were holding up the rear and doing their best to guard everyone's backs.  
  
When they reached the hall, though, another problem came to Archers attention.  
  
Maggie Claims was gone.  
  
"Great." She better not have wandered off. Granted this wasn't her time and all, but surly she could see the danger just by looking at the destruction around her.  
  
"T'pol."  
  
"Aye sir." She said moving her way toward the Captain.  
  
"We seem to have lost Ms. Claimes, and I'm really not of a mind to go yelling our position out with wounded. Would you go find her?"  
  
T'pol raised an eyebrow in as close as she came to irritation, and moved off to search for their reluctant guest.  
  
When she returned from her search the three wounded were seated on the floor of the lift and Trip and Archer were keeping the door open for her.  
  
"She no longer appears to be on this deck Captain. I found an access panel in the ceiling that was tampered with. She could be acting out of fear, evading the alien, or she could already be in its control."  
  
"I don't like either of those options." The captains said, rubbing his forehead with his hand. "Alright, lets get these people to sickbay and find out as much about this thing as possible so we can track it."  
  
T'pol nodded imperceptibly and entered the lift, the doors closing behind her.  
  
  
  
"It had a beak, I know that much sir. Rather hawk-like in appearance." Reed was saying as the doctor treated the nasty bump on his head. "It was orange in color and I defiantly felt claws." He motioned uneasily to the lacerations on his back.  
  
"Our sensors are still not able to track it sir, it may have the inane ability to evade such methods though." T'pol supplied to her Captain. Archer stood holding his head in one hand with the other resting on his hip. A sure sign of stress.  
  
"Like a survival trait you mean, that could be possible." Reed conceded.  
  
The doctor started to work on Malcolm's back.  
  
"It seems to have three claws, I would say no opposable thumb, and rather long sharp edges." The Doctor gladly supplied.  
  
"Well I certainly knew about the sharp." Malcolm commented under his breath.  
  
"What seemed to provoke it?" the Captain asked, finally looking Malcolm in the eyes.  
  
"I don't know sir. As soon as its particles re-adhered we were under attack. More then that I can't tell you, I was thrown in to the transporter controls and that's the last thing I remember before you showed up."  
  
"A close proximity to the creature could explain our inability to locate Ms. Claimes with the sensors as well."  
  
"Is there any way this thing is just acting out of fear?" the captain suggested.  
  
Reed shrugged, grimacing as the movement pulled at his healing skin.  
  
"With an unknown alien race, any motivation is a possibility." T'pol oh so helpfully supplied.  
  
"Well we are going to have to find some way to track it, or to locate Ms. Claimes. Make that your top priority." T'pol nodded and left sickbay.  
  
"As soon as the doc has you patched up Malcolm I want you to see what you can do to assist her."  
  
"Understood sir."  
  
Confidant only that he had done all he could here, the captain left sickbay.  
  
Reed turned to the doctor as Archer left. "This is not good."  
  
"No I would say not." The doctor said shaking his head as he saw to the last laceration on Malcolm's back.  
  
  
  
Maggie awoke to being dragged through a shaft by her right foot. It was definably not the most comfortable position to be in. When she went over a raised divider and hit her head she had to second that emotion.  
  
"Ow"  
  
She wouldn't have even realized that she had said it out loud if it hadn't been just the thing to make the BUBT turn and notice her again.  
  
Perfect.  
  
It was standing over her beak to nose before she could blink. The beak was huge with three nostrils at the base from which it was breathing heavily, or sniffing. It had two multifaceted eyes set in the front of its head like a human. They were beautiful. A collection of blues and greens, contrasting with the oranges of its completion. Coloring from both ends of the spectrum. She could see a large orange fin off the back of its head, it had blue and green scales sporadically spread on its base.  
  
Its feet and legs, which were braced on either side of her, looked like those of a raptor. Its large claws clicked when it walked, how it sneaked up on her she would never know.  
  
It was looking her straight in the eyes, as much as she could tell considering its eyes were multifaceted, but it seemed to be looking straight in her eyes. She felt something scaly graze her cheek; it was the same orange thing that had been wrapped around her middle earlier, a tail. That was pleasant.  
  
She tried to remember what she was supposed to do in this instance. Was she supposed to make eye contact and slow her breathing to show she wasn't afraid, or was she supposed to quicken her breathing and look down to show submission. God why had she not watched more animal planet.  
  
It growled again deep in its throat. Different from a dog growl, more resonating, like it was traveling through the fin before it came out the nostrils. She heard slight clicking notices, like an undercurrent to the growl. They seemed almost rhythmic, like a song.  
  
Woe, a song. A song like as in a language. She looked closer at the creature. It hadn't eaten her. It could have, easily. And there was at least one person still alive in the transporter room for them to have wounded. Which meant it wasn't just killing everything it saw.  
  
She turned her head and looked at the hand resting on its knuckles beside her head, it was shaking.  
  
It was scared.  
  
Well then why the heck had it kidnapped her?  
  
She felt herself shifting surreally from terror to indignation.  
  
What was so special about her that would make her a good traveling companion on its flight for freedom? There had been three other people in close proximity.  
  
It began to sniff her again with its beak, never taking its eyes from her face. Then it backed up and hunch down in front of her. Maggie sat up on her elbows to look at it. It just sat there as if waiting for her to figure something out. She hated when people did that. Like those people who delight in telling you a riddle and making you come up with the answer, like they have sworn an oath not to reveal it to anyone not smart enough to figure it out on their own.  
  
"Great, just great, large, scary, and condescending." She said as she pushed herself to a seated position.  
  
It actually cocked its head at her. If she hadn't been so terrified moments before she would have thought it the most adorable thing she had ever seen.  
  
Then again why shouldn't she? It hadn't hurt her. It was just scared and confused, and god knows she knew that feeling. Hadn't she felt the exact same way just hours before? She would have given anything for some common ground with any one. Even an ameba for a companion would have been better then making a journey on her own.  
  
And that's what it had done. That's all it had wanted, a companion who knew what it was going threw. Or maybe not even something that smart maybe something as simple as wanting to be near something that smelled familiar.  
  
It had sniffed her way before it had taken her with it. She probably, to a sensitive nose, smelled out of place here. Just like it was out of place here. Common ground. That's all it had wanted.  
  
She felt herself reaching out to it before she could stop. She touched its face lightly where its beak met flesh; it was cold, like cold- blooded. It leaned ever so slightly in to her touch. But still it kept its eyes on her. Her fingers came away with a slightly yellow liquid on them. It was bleeding.  
  
She pulled off her thin coat and with all her might, tore loose one of the sleeves. She then scooted forward cautiously and looked for the wound. It was on the underside of its beak, a scratch like from the jagged edge of something. She gingerly placed the sleeve against the cut.  
  
The creature pulled away and cocked its head at her slightly.  
  
"Its ok," she said holding out her hands for its inspection. "I'm just gunna see if I can stop the bleeding, ok." She tried to sound soothing. She had learned long ago in talking to her dog, that it's not what you say, its how you say it.  
  
She moved her hand forward again, this time it didn't back off. She lightly dabbed the wound, it didn't seem to be bleeding anymore. She then took the sleeve and tied it around her arm. If familiar smells were what triggered kindness in this thing, what was more familiar then its own blood.  
  
She looked back up at it and could have sworn she saw the corners of its beak where it met skin go up slightly.  
  
Now she was just letting her imagination get away with her. 


	8. Chapter 8

She had been following the creature through the bowels of the ship for who knew how long. She had scrapes on her knees and calluses on her palms. She had no idea if it even knew where it was going, and she was beyond the point of caring about what its reactions might be. Maggie just stopped crawling.  
  
The creature turned to look at her, cooking its head.  
  
"I'm not going any farther, my knees hurt, my hands hurt, and I'm in serous need of a nap."  
  
It backtracked and knelt before her.  
  
"Do you even have a plan, or are you just winging it?" she knew it wouldn't answer her, but it felt good to say it out loud anyway.  
  
  
  
"So explain to me why we can't locate at least Ms. Claims, she has a decidedly unique signature." The Captain was progressing beyond frustrated at this point.  
  
"It appears, captain, that her mere proximity to the creature has caused her signature to be blocked from our scans as well." T'pol answered matter of fact manner.  
  
"We need to just do a deck by deck search, sir." Reed said. The doctor had patched him up in no time and he was more then ready to get back to work again.  
  
"That would seem the most logical course open to us at this time captain." T'pol concurred.  
  
"Very well, Malcolm, Trip, compile search teams and divide the ship. Start from the transporter room out." Archer ran his hand through his hair, this was not going well.  
  
  
  
Things seemed to be going fairly well. Maggie had somehow, she didn't even understand, convinced the creature to start following her. After blundering through three decks she had finally managed to locate the mess hall. And not a moment to soon. She was starving, and the last thing she needed was the creature to realize it to needed a bite while they were still secluded in the vents, it they were indeed vents.  
  
She was really out of her element here. She convinced herself that she would feel much better and more adjusted once she got some food in her. She was certain that were all she needed.  
  
It took decidedly more work to get the creature to let her out in the open. She wasn't sure she would let her only link to reality out of her sight easily either, so she didn't blame him.  
  
She really needed to stop calling him the creature though.  
  
Maggie found the food cabinets easily; they were right next to the shelf where she and Hoshi were going to get their food from. From it she pulled two slices of pizza, apparently the chief hadn't forgotten after all.  
  
"Here" she set the plate on a table the creature was standing near. "You eat this, its really good, trust me." She demonstrated by picking up her piece and taking a bite. "Mmmm, really good." She gestured for the creature to do the same. He just cocked his head at her questioningly.  
  
"Suit yourself but I'm hunger." She said with a shrug as she finished off her piece.  
  
The creature bent its knees to bring its beak closer to the plate; it then began to sniff it experimentally. It poking it with it claw as if it might get up and run away.  
  
"It wont bite, honest."  
  
It didn't seem to be working.  
  
Then its third finger on its left hand rotated on a pivoting joint and with a slight pop sound became a long thumb. It used its hand now equipped with an opposable thumb, and picked up the pizza slice, sniffing it a couple more times.  
  
Then with what could only be described as a heaving sigh, it took a bite.  
  
  
  
*again sorry its so short, trying not to loose my muse here, (* 


	9. Chapter 9

Well it didn't die when it ate the pizza so that was a good thing right? And it wasn't eating her out of malicious intent so that also had to be of the good. All-in-all the trip to the mess hall had not been to bad an idea. She got to eat, and she earned the trust of her new friend here.  
  
"Ok I really need to name you. Unless you have a name of you own you would rather use instead, I'm cool with that too." The creature merely stared at her.  
  
She pointed to herself rather dramatically. "Maggie." She said it as plainly as she could so he would be sure to understand.  
  
Then she pointed at him.  
  
And she waited.  
  
And waited.  
  
Ok try, try again, right?  
  
"Maggie." She said again pointing to herself. Then she extended her arm again to point at the creature.  
  
It actually shrugged. She could have fallen backwards.  
  
She shook her head. Ok maybe it wasn't as intelligent as she had thought. She of course did not see what she thought she saw. Oh, oh, or maybe its language is so different that it can't say Maggie, or any other name just sounds. Maybe its people don't have names like we do.  
  
Or maybe she was anthropomorphosis it unfairly.  
  
"Well what ever the reason is that you can't answer me, I cant keep calling you creature, and I don't think you would like BUBT, if you knew what it stood for. So I'm going to have to give you a name." She nodded for emphasis to let it know she had made up her mind on this and there was no talking her out of it at all.  
  
So then came the arduous process of decided what name to give him.  
  
She paced freely around the mess hall, as the creature seemed to stay on the alert. She had a feeling it was for both their sakes. She was pretty sure, though, that in a state emergency, trips to the mess hall were rare. They were probably fairly safe where they were.  
  
So back to the name issue. She could go with the old stand bys, like Fluffy and Spike, but that didn't seem very dignified. Then again names like Jeeves and Stiles seemed too dignified for something that looked like a wingless gargoyle.  
  
In the end she just had to go with George. What was more basic then that. It would just have to do. And once she looked at him good and hard, well the name just sort of fit is all.  
  
"Ok I've decided." The creature, George, turned its head to face her, its blue-green eyes centering on her face.  
  
"I have to name you and I've decided that name will be George." She waited. Ok he didn't understand her; she knew this, not a new thing.  
  
She pointed to herself. "Maggie." Then she extended her arm out to it, "George."  
  
She repeated this about four times; till she was satisfied it had properly grasped the situation.  
  
"Ok George what do we do now?"  
  
Just then George must have heard something outside, he amazingly grabbed Maggie's hand and led her to a dark corner of the mess. She was going to ask him, rhetorically of course, what he was doing, when she heard the door open. For a minute she remained paralyzed in the dark with George, feeling surprisingly safe having him and his claws nearby, then she remembered, she wasn't afraid of these people. These were the people would had saved her off that waist hole of a planet down there. She had absolutely no reason to hide. And really neither did George.  
  
She was about to get up and let out their position when George grabbed her arm and moved them to the farther corner, away from the windows, which, with the orbit of the ship, were now letting in light.  
  
"I really don't think there hiding in here Malcolm." She heard Trips voice from one of the siluettes in the doorway. The other had an almost imperceptible limp. Had to be that officer from the bridge, he most have been among the injured earlier.  
  
  
  
TO BE CONTINUED…  
  
It will get more interesting after this 


	10. Chapter 10

George tried to pull her deeper in to the shadows. Maggie was sure though, that if she could just get the attention of the two siluettes, they could sort everything out and things would be well on their way to normal again. Well normal as things could be for a bird-like raptor and a time traveling engineer. Any bit of normality was to be embraced, though, as far as Maggie was concerned at least.  
  
  
  
"I thought I heard voices in here." Malcolm said, explaining to his comrade why he had ducked in to the mess hall. They scanned the room the best they could with their eyes.  
  
"How about some light Trip, I can't see a thing." He suggested.  
  
"Sure blame the engineer for your poor eyesight." Trip muttered good naturedly as he made his way back to the door and the light controls.  
  
  
  
Maggie knew what was coming, unfortunately George seemed to think they were leaving, when the lights come on, well it would not be good. She tried to get some purchase with her feet on the carpeting without making noise, and with her had she tried to cover George's large eyes. George merely pushed her arm down and cocked his head at her; it seemed to be his signature move.  
  
'Oh this is not good, not good.' She thought to her self as she saw Trip fumbling with the lights.  
  
  
  
Trip finally found the right switch after opening and closing the door and pouring himself a glass of water. Some engineer, but door controls weren't really his forte. With a triumphant flip of the switch the entire mess lit up.  
  
And that's when things got interesting.  
  
  
  
George just freaked out. He grabbed a tighter hold on her and started to, well the only way to describe it is, to scream like a girl. It was the shrillest call she had ever heard. Unfortunately he was hugging her with her arms at her sides and there was just no way for her to plug her ears.  
  
Malcolm and Trip had their weapon pointed at her and were simultaneously reassuring her everything would be all right and proving it wouldn't by threatening George and waving weapons around.  
  
This was really not a good spot to be in.  
  
It was then that she came to realize that her gargoyle wasn't so wingless after all. From his sides, hidden perfectly under a thin flap of skin, he extended two hardened flexible membranes. He flexed the blue-green shell like skin once and then stretched it over the both of them.  
  
"Great." Her muffled mumble barely even reached her ears.  
  
  
  
"Great, just great." Malcolm said as he started to lower his pulse pistol. There was no way to hit the creature now with out possibly hitting Ms. Claimes.  
  
"Well there has to be another way to get her out of there, other then shooting her out that is." Trip said as he leaned forward on a table and eyed the blue-green mass before them in the corner.  
  
"Not likely, and I think it knows that."  
  
"Listen, if its no more then an animal, maybe we just need to coax it out. It doesn't seem to have hurt her yet, maybe its just scared."  
  
"Coax it out with what exactly." Malcolm said looking at Trip with thinly veiled sarcasm.  
  
Trip made his way back over to the door controls. "I don't know you're the expert in dealing with these sort of hostage situations, you tell me." He pushed the COM button down. "Trip to Archer."  
  
"Archer here." Came the almost instant reply.  
  
"We've found the alien and Ms. Claimes, both seem intact."  
  
"Were are you?"  
  
"Mess hall sir."  
  
"We're on our way." And the link cut out.  
  
"If it is just an animal, more unfamiliar people in here might not be a good idea." Malcolm ventured, trying to come at the problem from a different angle.  
  
  
  
From inside her cocoon Maggie was sure that she heard talking in the mess hall. As it was all she heard was Georges heartbeat and breathing and the occasional 'mmuoph licophum hhmmuphrum' from the outside world. She highly doubted that was what they were really saying. If they were trying to communicate, well they weren't going to get very far.  
  
  
  
To Be Continued…  
  
If my chapters were any longer, you wouldn't have an update for weeks, so be thankful  
  
: ) I'm doing my best over here. 


	11. Chapter 11

*Here it is the long awaited finally. I wish it was longer, but you can only squeeze so many words in to a single thought before it becomes bogged down. So this will just have to do. Enjoy please, I must say the ending even took me by surprise ( and please don't refrain from reviewing. See you guys in the next story. *  
  
  
  
Archer and T'pol raced in to the Mess hall, well as much as a Vulcan can race. What he saw was defiantly not what he had expected.  
  
Trip and Malcolm seemed to be defending themselves, from across the room, against a large blue-green ball of flesh.  
  
"What's the status?"  
  
"It seems our guest had a few surprises we weren't ready for, it opened so hardened membranes and is now 'protecting' Ms.Claimes." Trip explained.  
  
"Well that's …inconvenient."  
  
The four of them stared at the two at the other side of the mess hall.  
  
No one seemed forthcoming with the ideas.  
  
  
  
Maggie pushed against the membrane form the inside.  
  
"George, let me go. I want out. These people are nice, I like them, we will be fine." She could hardly hear her own voice; she just hoped George had better ears.  
  
Slowly, almost imperceptibly she felt the membrane loosen its grip.  
  
"That's it, let us out. We will be fine." She soothingly patted the inside of the membrane to get her point across; it continued to loosen as she continued to talk soothingly.  
  
  
  
"It's opening." T'pol commented as the membrane started to peel apart.  
  
What it reviled was not what they expected.  
  
From the inside they heard Maggie speaking in a low voice as she gently rubbed the skin of the creature in a soothing manner.  
  
"I think we may have our dynamics wrong here Captain." Trip said as he started to lower his weapon.  
  
"I think your right." Malcolm concurred as he to put his weapon at ease.  
  
"Are you ok Ms.Claimes?" Archer asked as she came in to view.  
  
Maggie merely nodded her positive response as she continued to placate the creature.  
  
  
  
She was actually a little astonished that they had actually taken so much time and manpower for her, a new comer not even from their time. She turned her head and looked George in the eyes. He seemed a little skittish, but for the most part he seemed also willing to trust her.  
  
"Captain, I'm going to stand up now, please don't shot me." She hoped by keeping it light hearted the atmosphere in the room would loose some of its tension. She heard Trip stifle a laugh and figured it worked ok.  
  
Slowly she stood and turned her whole body to face George were he crouched on the ground. He was looking less and less nervous the longer she looked at him. She reached her arm out to him to invite him to stand.  
  
He started at it for a moment and then did that thing that looked frighteningly like a smile. With supreme smoothness he took and moved forward a step to stand beside her.  
  
It was Maggie's turn to cock her head this time.  
  
"George?"  
  
"Who's George?" Archer asked.  
  
"I named him George." She answered dismissively over her shoulder.  
  
Archer looked at Trip and Malcolm, they merely shrugged.  
  
"You named him?" Archer asked it in a neutral voice so as not to escalate the situation.  
  
"Well I couldn't very well keep calling him 'the creature."  
  
"He talks to you?" Malcolm asked incredulously  
  
"Of course not, but just because he cant doesn't mean I cant talk to him. Sometimes all it takes is a little communication." She reached out and touched George on the cheek. He leaned in to her hand ever so slightly.  
  
"It seems we really weren't needed her Cap." Trip commented.  
  
"It would appear the situation is in hand." T'pol concurred.  
  
"I think he was just scarred, because of the whole pulled out of his world and suddenly here among strangers bit. I know I was. He latched on to the familiar, me, because I'm just as out of place."  
  
"That would seem a logical assessment. Your sent and biometric signature would not yet have conformed to that of the rest present on the ship."  
  
"So he kidnapped you out of comradery?" the captain actually sounded like he had been worried.  
  
"He didn't kidnap me, I think he was trying to protect me."  
  
"From what?"  
  
Maggie turned to face them. "From you."  
  
"We did point our weapons at her in the hallway sir." Trip supplied.  
  
"And from the creatures point of view it may have seemed as though she was our prisoner. Her unique smell and signature would have confirmed that assumption for it." T'pol finished.  
  
"See, he wasn't really being the aggressor I don't think." She looked hopefully at Archer, not quite sure what she was waiting for him to do.  
  
Archer sighed deeply. "At least your alright. Lets see if we can't persuade you and 'George' here to come to sickbay. From there we'll decide how we need to deal with this new passenger. Meanwhile, T'pol I need you and Trip to find a way to close that door down on that planet before it opens on a black hole."  
  
"Aye sir."  
  
"Great sickbay, I was beginning to miss that place." Maggie murmured under her breath. Then she startled herself by realizing she wasn't going to argue with the captain, as his stair would indicate he was prepared for her to do, about the closing of the door. It meant possibly the end of any hope of ever getting home. But the more she thought of that the more she wondered what she was really leaving behind that was so important.  
  
Here she could see her engine at work, help maintain it and improve it. Here she didn't have to worry about a discontinuation of funding or being put in an institution. They seemed so willing to accept her here, so willing to easily befriend her if Hoshi was any gage.  
  
At home she really didn't have any friends. She had collogues, but if it was between her and their work she knew the science would win. She really had no family left except her uncle either, and they were good acquaintances at best.  
  
No, this wouldn't be a bad place to be stuck.  
  
T'pol turned and left the room, followed by Trip. Malcolm and Archer waited patiently for her to start coxing George forward. She smiled good- naturedly and then turned to face George and the problem of his first trip to sickbay.  
  
When she turned though, she was confronted with a site she didn't expect to see.  
  
George was standing there completely relaxed, his membranes once again covered at his side. He seemed like nothing was out of the ordinary, like he had not, just seconds ago, been cowering in the corner.  
  
That was nothing compared to what he did next, something that coursed Archer to reach forward and draw her behind his and Malcolm's ready weapons. George proceeded to change shape.  
  
It was not the most pleasant thing to witness either. There was cracking of bones and peeling of skin, it was something Maggie could have gone her whole life without seeing and been completely content.  
  
When it was done they were looking at the back of a fully clothed man. That in itself was strange enough, but when he turned around it was all she could do not to set the new passing out record.  
  
She grabbed the back of Captain Archer's uniform.  
  
"Mark." She said it so softly it was barely audible.  
  
"Hi Mag. surprised to see me." He smiled in that boyish way of his and waved at her.  
  
"Who are you?" Archer asked.  
  
"So sorry to intrude on you good captain, and cause such trouble on your ship as well, I really am." He still hadn't answered the question Maggie noticed.  
  
So she answered for him. "This is Mark, the colleague who sent me on this free trip through time."  
  
"She is correct, except I do prefer it spelled with a 'Q'." he seemed to be waiting for some kind of reaction. "You know hundreds of years from now that would be both amusing and extremely enlightening on the situation." He sighed.  
  
"So your name is mark. How did you just do that?" Archer still had his weapon pointed squarely at his chest.  
  
"Lets just say captain that I am beyond your realm of existence. There are others like me, one in particular I hope never finds you amusing, though intuition tells me he will, that and the fact I know it will happen." He smiled, no one else did. Again he sighed. "Bottom line is that I like Maggie, she was unhappy, and really on the way to seriously disrupting the space time flow with her little engine break though. You could say she was meant to be her, so I was meant to do this, so it's just the way it should be. But that's getting in to time paradoxes."  
  
"You brought me here on purpose?" Maggie said from behind Archer.  
  
"Honestly Maggie, you'll be happier here. At home you were alone, and no one really believed your ideas would work. Her you have credibility and the opportunity to make friends who understand you. That's much better isn't it?" he was smiling almost fatherly at her, which was disconcerting because she had always thought them close to the same age.  
  
"You sent me here?" she just couldn't get past it.  
  
"Yes." He answered indulgingly.  
  
"I was so scared." She said it almost to herself.  
  
"Of course you were, that's only natural, but it passed, and so will the awkwardness. You're headed for great things Maggie, but here among the stars, not hundreds of feet below ground."  
  
"How do you know this?" Archer asked.  
  
"Lets just say that I do and leave it at that captain. I will repair the damage to you ship and close the little door for you, I do apologize for the inconvenience, but I really think it was necessary."  
  
He smiled again at Maggie.  
  
"You will be happy here, I promise." She absently nodded; still not sure she was processing the information correctly. "Captain if you would be so good as to look after her. And I wish you all an eventful journey." He smiled one last time and in a blinding flash of light was gone.  
  
"T'pol to Archer."  
  
Archer absently reached back and pressed the button. "Go ahead."  
  
"Captain the door has appeared to close itself."  
  
"Understood."  
  
"Sir?" Trips voice came over the COM.  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Reports are coming in that the damage in the transporter room and the surrounding area seems to have fixed itself."  
  
"Understood." Archer closed the link before Trip could continue.  
  
"I have no idea how I'm going to enter this in to the log."  
  
"I don't envy you sir." Malcolm said, as he too seemed to be walking in a fog of no understanding.  
  
"I think I would like to go to sickbay now." Maggie said childishly tugging on Archers suit.  
  
"I think I'll go with you."  
  
"Me too." Malcolm piped in.  
  
As they left the room and Malcolm turned out the lights Maggie addressed one last question to them both.  
  
"Every day wont be like this will it?"  
  
"I sure hope not." Archer answered, Malcolm backing him up with hearty nods.  
  
  
  
THE END  
  
Did you like it? I think it may be the start of a series. 


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